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I was the Director for a Holiday 12U BB tournament a few years ago when the weather was threatening. I really wanted to get this tournament done. Every 5 -8 minutes someone would say they saw lightning, though usually from a different direction. Though I heard rumbling in the distance, I never saw any lightening. Then my attention was diverted for a few minutes.
Suddenly I felt scared. Everything was silent; the light was an ugly yellow-green. I looked up into the West and saw what looked like a long Lake Michigan wave rolling directly at us. I have never seen anything like this; it was hideous in color and tiny sparks of lightning were jumping in it. I panicked and ran to the fields, screaming at the umpires to kill the game and get everybody to the parking lot.
Within minutes we were enveloped in a horrible storm. Very few got to their cars without being soaked; dozens more were trapped under the pavilion. The lightening snapped and cracked and rain came down in buckets, so fast that we soon had 4" of standing water in the outfield grass!
No one hurt, but lesson learned! Never again will I keep anyone on the field just for a lousy ball game. Now I follow the guidlines explicitly .
WMB
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